A Call for Change
Blog / Produced by The High Calling
Fr. Bill Wilson, a priest from California, trained to be a bishop through the finest education the Roman church offered and during the process became an alcoholic. He attended Vatican II and was determined to immediately bring the changes suggested there to his own monastery. He attempted to organize the young monks in a revolt against the older monks and the monastery status quo. His attitude was so obnoxious that he was asked to leave. He came to the States as an assistant priest with the same attitude and was asked to leave that church. In his next role as an assistant, he was again in trouble.
One day, Fr. Bill went to the beach. He spread his towel near a young father whose six-year-old daughter was busy filling a small bucket with pieces of broken shells. Bill was pensive. "I should at least have been a bishop by now. Here I am—alcoholic, disagreeable. I could have been a father like this young man and had a beautiful daughter." About that time, the child came to her father with her partially filled bucket. The father was delighted. He said, "Sweetheart, they are wonderful. Go fill your whole bucket." She ran off, laughter ringing in the air.
Again Bill lamented that he never married. Then he heard a blazing inner voice say, "Yes, and a good thing you weren't. If your daughter had brought you a partially filled bucket of broken shells, you would have said, 'Get that pitiful bucket out of here! They're only a bunch of broken pieces.'" Silence filled him.
His life as a child appeared to him. He saw himself before God, the Father, presenting his bucket of broken pieces. God delighted to receive him and his broken offering. Bill left the beach . . . changing.
Years later, Bill was invited to the 25th anniversary of his monastery—the very one that had expelled him. He went, but took a room in the local inn. He knew no one in the monastery would want to see him. But before he could settle in, the phone rang. It was the abbot, the very one he had tried to unseat.
"Bill, what are you doing staying in the inn? Get up here where you belong!" It was God's gracious way of giving one man a new, free, and joy-filled attitude.
All around us self-help books, psychological systems, and advertising call for change. Jesus required change, too—change so extensive that the disciples did not begin to grasp it until after the resurrection. But Jesus also showed how to cause a real difference; the law couldn't do it, but love could . . . and it still can.
One day, Fr. Bill went to the beach. He spread his towel near a young father whose six-year-old daughter was busy filling a small bucket with pieces of broken shells. Bill was pensive. "I should at least have been a bishop by now. Here I am—alcoholic, disagreeable. I could have been a father like this young man and had a beautiful daughter." About that time, the child came to her father with her partially filled bucket. The father was delighted. He said, "Sweetheart, they are wonderful. Go fill your whole bucket." She ran off, laughter ringing in the air.
Again Bill lamented that he never married. Then he heard a blazing inner voice say, "Yes, and a good thing you weren't. If your daughter had brought you a partially filled bucket of broken shells, you would have said, 'Get that pitiful bucket out of here! They're only a bunch of broken pieces.'" Silence filled him.
His life as a child appeared to him. He saw himself before God, the Father, presenting his bucket of broken pieces. God delighted to receive him and his broken offering. Bill left the beach . . . changing.
Years later, Bill was invited to the 25th anniversary of his monastery—the very one that had expelled him. He went, but took a room in the local inn. He knew no one in the monastery would want to see him. But before he could settle in, the phone rang. It was the abbot, the very one he had tried to unseat.
"Bill, what are you doing staying in the inn? Get up here where you belong!" It was God's gracious way of giving one man a new, free, and joy-filled attitude.
All around us self-help books, psychological systems, and advertising call for change. Jesus required change, too—change so extensive that the disciples did not begin to grasp it until after the resurrection. But Jesus also showed how to cause a real difference; the law couldn't do it, but love could . . . and it still can.
